Reaping the Consequences
by LostinOblivion
Summary: They broke-up two months ago, but sometimes consequences take time to become obvious.


_A/N: None of Severence happened, except the sex in the bus, for the purposes of this story. Matt and Emily are still broken up from the fight at the kiddie prison._

* * *

Emily sat fidgeting in Cheryl's office, waiting for her boss to arrive. She'd gotten to work way too early, partly to talk to Cheryl, but mostly because she just couldn't sleep. Things were nagging at her, big important things that had her constantly nibbling on her lips in anxiety. It didn't help that she'd spent the better part of the last few days reprimanding herself severely. In between chewing her lips, scratching her head, and playing with her hands, she was giving herself a very harsh mental lashing.

How could she be so stupid? So blatantly careless? Well, now she was reaping the consequences of her ignorance. It didn't help that she was exhausted, having barely slept since she found out two weeks ago. She was already stressed, and then this happened, and god, everything was so messed up. And, now she had Lia trying to feed her cheeseburgers so she'd put some weight back on. She hadn't realized it showed that much, but Lia made it clear she was worried. Great.

She turned to look out the window, where her former partner was just getting in, eyes focused on a stack of papers on his desk. Matt actually got in before Cheryl? Maybe he was having trouble sleeping too. It would make sense, she rationalized hopefully; it was going to take them both time to get used to sleeping alone again.

Or maybe he got laid last night, and his new bedmate is an early riser. The thought made her throat tight, but she had to admit that was probably more accurate. Duff told Lia that Matt was seeing a woman, not really seriously yet, but they'd been out more than a few times, and seemed to enjoy each other's company. He'd stopped getting shit-faced at Sloan's every night, so she must being doing something for him.

They'd called it quits almost exactly two months ago, and they'd had fierce break-up sex in the command bus seven long weeks ago. She wasn't about to forget that soon, no that she would be remembering for the rest of her life. Emily sighed and played with the cuff of her jacket, easing up the grip her teeth kept on her bottom lip. God, Matt was right, one of these days, she was going to draw blood. He always told her that; he thought it was cute, but he was afraid she'd bleed herself.

"Emily, good morning," Cheryl greeted surprised and way too happily for the morning.

"Hey, good night last night?" Emily was kind of amused. Cheryl Carerra was not a morning person, but she seemed genuinely pleased to be awake.

"Had a very good third date."

"I'm guessing so good you didn't wake up alone?"

"I didn't go to bed alone, but I did wake-up alone. He had to leave in the middle of the night to do some emergency CIA thing." She waved a hand around, gesturing.

"You're dating a spook?" Emily asked curiously.

"He's not intimidated by the gun or the rank, and I don't work with him. You know how hard that is to come by." Cheryl gave her a look. They'd both learned the hard way that dating a coworker is miserable, especially when you love them.

"So, clearly you didn't come in here to discuss my love life, what's up?" She turned to all business now.

She'd been a bit concerned about Emily the last month or so. Cheryl knew her friend's father had passed away about four weeks ago, and Emily spent a weekend in Albany burying him. She also knew the negotiator was beginning to look increasingly tired, as if she wasn't sleeping well, or at all. Most disconcerting though was the weight-loss. Six pounds was her estimate, and that wasn't a big deal on some people, but Emily was already thin, so it showed. Everyone had noticed, even her new partner had felt the need to bring his concerns to Cheryl.

"Uh well, I need to take a few vacation days, and when I get back I need you to take me out of the field for a while." God, she hated saying that. She loved her job, and loved being in the field.

"Okay…what's going on Emily? Are you alright?" Cheryl scrutinized her worriedly.

"Yeah, I'm fine. I uh…I'm…well I kind of…oh god, I'm pregnant," she moaned miserably.

"You're…wait what…how? I didn't…I didn't realize you were dating anyone," Cheryl struggled, flabbergasted. She was stunned beyond even what she imagined she could be, but underneath all she could think was about Matt watching Emily carry another man's child. It would break his heart, even if he was seeing that Cindy woman.

"I'm not, you know, seeing anyone."

"Oh, so uh…alright I'm turning off the boss thing now, and I'm just a friend. Please tell me you know his name," Cheryl pled.

"What? No! No, it wasn't like that!" Emily defended herself in horror. God, Cheryl thought a one-night stand knocked her up. Perfect.

"Well then whose the father? If you aren't dating anyone, and he wasn't a one night—" Cheryl cut herself off abruptly. "Oh god, oh no, it's Matt's, isn't it?"

Emily nodded, but didn't offer a comment.

"Wait, how pregnant are you?"

"Seven weeks and counting."

"But, you guys were broken up seven weeks ago?" Cheryl asked puzzled.

"Break-up sex, Cheryl. I went off the birth control when we broke it off, and didn't think about it when we slept together again."

"Never tell that kid that." Cheryl watched Emily nod, and then go quiet, biting her lip.

"You're still solely in friend-mode right, you're not my boss right now?" She asked.

"Yes…why does it feel like you're going to tell me something I won't like?"

"This baby was conceived in the back of the command bus." Emily hung her head; it just sounded so trashy.

"You had sex in the command bus! At work! After a negotiation!" So, there were clearly moments when Cheryl couldn't separate her job role as well as she'd like.

Emily cringed, she thought it might be a bad idea to tell her, but she just needed to tell someone. Share her horror at the situation sort of.

"Sorry, sorry, but what possessed you two?" Cheryl felt a little bad for exploding; her friend clearly didn't need that right now.

"Hormones? I don't know."

"Have you told Matt yet?"

"No. I don't know how to tell him. I don't want to tell him. These vacation days are partly time to help me figure out how to do that, and figure out how to get this to work. I know Matt, he'll want to be involved, but we can't talk to each other with getting nasty. We're going to have to figure out some sort of custody plan." Emily's body sagged, seeming to deflate at the thought.

They'd never really talked about kids when they were together, but the thought had crossed her mind. At least then when she got nervous because her period was late a few days, she at least knew that he'd be there for her and with her, and that they loved each other. It made it easier to handle those scares. Now, she was really pregnant, and he didn't love her anymore. At least, she didn't think he did. She still loved him though, and having his baby wasn't going to help that.

"Emily, I know if feels like a lot right now, and I can't imagine how hard it is. If I'd gotten pregnant by Sam from break-up sex, I'd probably have shot him. That being said, you seem to be handling it rather well, and you can take as many of your vacation days as you need to sort this out." Cheryl showed her a soft smile, hoping to encourage her in the thought that everything would be alright.

"Thanks, I'll just grab my things and go then. You'll put Max with Matt?" Max Fuentes was her new partner, and Matt's new partner, a brand new negotiator, transferred after their first negotiation. He just wasn't up for the stress.

"Yep…Max and Matt, that's going to be fun," Cheryl chuckled, rolling her eyes.

"Yeah, can't even use last names, Fuentes and Flannery," Emily pointed out.

"That's a migraine waiting to happen," Cheryl sighed. Emily offered her sympathetic eyes.

"Well enjoy. I have to run, first OBGYN appointment." Emily rolled her eyes. She was not looking forward to appointments there every month for seven or eight months. Once a year was more than enough.

"Good luck, and Emily?" Cheryl addressed her softly. Emily was standing, but didn't move toward the door.

"Remember you have a lot of friends here, and they'll all help you out," Cheryl promised her.

"Thanks," Emily smiled gratefully, and left. She gathered her things from her new desk, and high-tailed it out of the CNU, ignoring her coworkers confused looks. In particular, she ignored Matt, because if she looked at him, looked in those brown eyes, she might just break down.

Cheryl chose that moment to pop her head out. "Fuentes move over by Flannery, you're partners now. Congratulations."

She was gone as quick as she appeared. Matt was confused, but Max just shrugged, grabbed a box and began tossing his stuff in. Temple and Binder exchanged looks, something weird was going on. Everyone was wondering the same thing though—had Emily asked to transfer out of LA? Was she leaving?

Matt dropped his pen, and walked over to Cheryl's office, knocking quietly before entering.

"Is she leaving?" No pretense, he just put it out there.

"What?" Cheryl looked up at him.

"Emily, is she transferring out?"

"No, she's not." She didn't offer anything more.

"Then why am I working with her new partner?" Matt asked, not quite believing her.

"Emily is taking a few vacation days, and when she comes back, she won't be in the field for a while." Cheryl kept her voice cold and detached, if she allowed herself to sympathize, she might blurt Emily's secret. It wasn't her place to tell that.

"Why? What's wrong with her?" Matt demanded, his pulse suddenly speeding up. For Emily to not be in the field something had to be seriously wrong.

"Nothing's wrong with her, Matt," Cheryl sighed.

"For her to drop fieldwork, something has to be. Is she sick? I saw that she lost weight, and I can tell that she's tired. What's wrong with her, Cheryl?" He could feel himself start to panic, the possibilities racing through his head.

"Jesus Matt, go ask her if you need to know so badly." She shook her head. She'd noticed Emily was looking tired and thinner lately, but it was clear now that it was stress, vomiting, and probably a little depression.

"You won't tell me?"

"No. Whatever she told me was in confidence as her boss and her friend." This is where being friends with both kind of sucked. Matt looked a little desperate and scared, and Emily was probably feeling the same at the doctor's office.

They could make each other feel better, she knew that.

Matt nodded, and turned and left. If Cheryl said she was keeping a confidence, she wouldn't break it, not for anything.

* * *

Five o'clock was both too slow and too fast coming around. It was too slow because it gave him that long to think about all the possibilities of what could be wrong with Emily. Cancer, chemo would take a while, some awful autoimmune she had to get control of, an organ disease that would stick her the hospital to wait out a transplant, and a dozen other possibly fatal illness swept though his head. With each one, he was more convinced something was very wrong, and more determined to talk to her. That's why it came too fast; he was going to go see her, but that was easier said than done.

At her apartment door, he struggled to slow his heart long enough to knock and greet her like a normal human being. He swallowed the egg-sized lump in his throat, and knocked solidly on her door.

"Matt?" She blurted in surprise seeing him.

"Are you sick?" He demanded, and there went all his careful struggling to remain calm.

"What?" Emily asked trying to get her head back on, utterly bewildered.

"You're leaving field work, you look exhausted, and Em, you always looked healthy. You never looked like one of those starving models in magazines, but now, you're getting there. What's wrong? Are you sick? I know I have no right to know anymore, but please Em, I need to know if you aren't alright." Matt's heart was racing, and he was struggling to keep breathing at a normal pace.

She might tell him to go to hell, that they weren't dating anymore, and therefore he didn't need to know. He might sink to his knees and beg if she did that.

Emily looked wide-eyed, and open-mouthed at him for a moment, before opening the door wider and allowing him in. She sat on the couch, and Matt parked himself on the chair, already feeling like he was about to jump out of his own skin.

"I'm not sick, Matt," she assured him. Emily was so tired, she just wanted to sleep, not have this conversation now.

"Then what's wrong?"

"I'm pregnant," she said. It came out easily, as if she didn't feel anything about it, and right then, maybe she didn't.

Matt didn't look surprised often, but he did now. Then he got over it, and his features tensed, almost hardened.

"Who is he?"

"Who?"

"The man that got you pregnant. Does he even know?" Matt was upset. Hurt that she moved on, jealous that some other man gotten her pregnant, and angry that this guy apparently paid so much attention he didn't realized his girlfriend looked like hell.

"He knows," Emily said tiredly.

"Then where the hell is he?" Anger was winning over quickly.

"What?" Emily asked, taken aback at his tone.

"Is he going to be there for you, Em? Is he going to hold your hair back while your vomiting? Squeeze your hand during the doctor's appointments? Hold you when you cry because it feels like it's too much? Is he going to take care of you, and treat you right? Is he going to do right by that baby?" Matt went off. What he wasn't saying was that if any of those answers were no, he was going to find the little punk and castrate him.

"I don't know, are you?" Emily asked, face as serious as Matt's was hostile. She was too damn tired to run circles around anything.

Matt stood in utter shock, seemingly unable to comprehend what she just said. He didn't blink, didn't speak, just sat there, staring at her as if she'd just landed on Earth and walked off the mothership. Thank god, he'd been sitting.

"What?" He finally asked, so quietly she barely heard him.

"I'm seven weeks along, Matt. That day in the command bus? I'd stopped taking my birth control, and we didn't think to use a condom. The baby is yours." That was why she was such a damned idiot. How could she not think about birth control? How could she be so irresponsible?

"My baby. You're having my baby," Matt spoke to himself, trying to make it make sense.

"Yeah…look we obviously need to talk, but I'm exhausted. I'm going to take a nap. You can sit here and process this, you know your way around the place." She went to get up, but Matt stopped her.

"Wait, if you're pregnant you should be gaining weight, not losing it."

"It's been a rough couple months, I don't eat right when I'm stressed, plus I'm puking all the time. My doctor's on top of it, says I have to make sure I eat real meals, and if I have trouble keeping things down he'll give me anti-nausea medication. I'm fine, Matt," Emily promised.

For a man that she'd broken up with two months ago, and was dating another woman, he was awfully worried about her. Maybe she was wrong, maybe he did still love her. She couldn't decide if that would make things easier or harder.

"Okay, go take your nap. I'll be here when you get up." They had to talk, he couldn't leave now.

Emily nodded, and trudged tiredly off to her bedroom.

Matt sat for a long while, staring into space, and trying to wrap his mind around this news. After an hour he called Cheryl, and she admitted that she knew, and knew it was his. And yes, if he needed it, he could take a couple vacation days and figure this out with Emily. She was there is they needed her, as were the rest of their friends. Of course, none of the rest of them knew yet, so far as Matt knew. Lia might know, but she was being awfully quiet if she did, not that she wouldn't keep a secret.

Around seven, he picked up the menu for a good Italian restaurant a few blocks from Emily's apartment. He ordered her favorite dish there—tricolor tortellini with veggies in a pink sauce, got himself Chicken Marsala, breadsticks, and bruschetta as an appetizer. They promise delivery in 45 minutes. First thing he needed to do was make sure she ate, then they'd have to talk about things.

Matt found himself in her bedroom, where Emily was still sound asleep. He pulled a chair close to the bed, and sat, just watching her. He was trying to picture her as a mother, trying to picture their baby inside her. He couldn't see her with a big belly, not in his head at least. He looked at her flat belly, and tried to tell himself their baby was resting inside. Their baby. They made a baby. He and Emily made a baby. He was going to be a father. It scared him, it excited him a little, but mostly, it just put him in a state of awe.

"Matt?" Emily started and looked at him sleepily. "What are you doing?"

"Just watching you sleep."

"You're aware that's a little creepy right?" Now she was fully awake, and leaning on an arm watching.

"I don't know, I used to watch you sleep all the time when we were together," Matt asked and shrugged.

"Yeah, you were in the bed then, so not creepy. Sitting in the chair is a little creepy."

"Sorry," he told her, slightly offended.

"It's alright. That I know you won't hurt me makes it a lot less weird," she said and shrugged.

"You're right, I'd never hurt you. I was really just trying to imagine a baby inside you," he explained.

"It's weird isn't it," she scrunched her nose up.

"A little, yeah."

"I've been trying to do the same thing, but the only thing I feel to know there's a baby in me is the nausea. Beyond that it doesn't seem possible."

"Can I touch your stomach?" It came to him so suddenly, so innocently.

Emily nodded, and Matt reached out his hand nervously, and rested it on her stomach. He hadn't touched her in seven weeks, she'd been off limits, and now it made him nervous. He tried to imagine their baby sleeping under his fingertips.

They both jumped ten feet when the doorbell rang.

"Oh, that's dinner."

"What did you order?"

"Your favorite from that Italian restaurant," he said, smiling.

"Hmm, you read my mind." Emily closed her eyes picturing the tortellini.

"I try," he grinned again and ran to get the door.

They talked a bit while they ate, a large part of it Matt coaching Emily to keep eating, and her rolling her eyes at him. Emily told him about her doctor's appointment, and care and future appointments for the next several months. She already filled the prescription for prenatal vitamins. Her morning sickness tended to come in the middle of the night, a big part of the sleeplessness. They baby wouldn't move inside her for another couple of months. It was gentle, easy conversation, the kind that they could smile through.

The break-up, custody issues, and them issues would have to wait until after dinner. Of course, after dinner came quicker than they both wanted it to. Matt cursed himself out loud for not thinking of dessert, but Emily assured him she couldn't have eaten it anyway. They were able to pretend through dinner that they hadn't broken-up, that Matt wasn't dating another woman, and that Emily hadn't gone out with Alex Winston. It was only a couple of times, but well, she'd still gone, and did it to hurt Matt.

"So, we should talk about how this is going to work between us," Emily started, after they'd cleared the table and washed dishes.

"Yeah, I guess we should," Matt agreed nervously.

"I don't want to fight anymore, Matt. I'm too tired, and we can't raise a child that way. And, I know we've said and done some pretty awful things to each other, but tonight, because of the baby, we were okay. I think we can continue being civil to each other."

"You're right, I don't want to fight with, and I certainly don't want to upset you while you're in such a delicate condition."

Emily raised her eyebrows at that. "Very old fashioned wording of you."

"I figured it was more polite that saying while you're knocked-up."

Emily laughed at that. "I guess so. Okay, so we should discuss custody arrangements then?"

Matt's jawed tensed, and he frowned. He'd told himself to be honest with her, even though she may not take it well, but he was still nervous.

"Em, I want to be absolutely honest with you, okay?"

Emily nodded, and swallowed painfully, her own nerves riding her.

"I still love you. I never stopped, and don't know that I ever will stop. So, I don't know if I can love you and have a baby with you, without being with you. And, I want to be with you, Em." So, it wasn't his most articulate moment, but he figured she'd get the idea.

"Define being with me," she instructed.

"Uh, going out together, staying in together, being the one you wake-up with when you have a nightmare, you know, being what we were." His eyes burned into hers, trying to make her see that he needed her. If she asked him to, he was ready get down on his knees and cry.

"Do you think that's a good idea, Matt?" Emily nibbled her lip.

"We aren't partners anymore, that can't interfere. And yeah, I think it's the best damn idea I've had in months," he said.

That was what she wanted to hear, that he was certain, even if he had no right to be. Just that he believed that it was really, truly a good idea, helped her believe it was too. She'd been wanting him back practically since they broke-up, but she was too chicken-shit to try for him.

She stood up and took his hand, pulling him up. Then she just melted into his arms, holding him close, and resting her face against his neck. "God, I missed you."

"Me too."

They just stood that way for a while, holding each other tightly, reveling in the feel of that familiar body pressed against their own. They'd wasted two months, but it seemed biology at least, was rooting for them. If Emily had stayed on her birth control, or they'd had the presence of mind to think about a condom, she wouldn't have gotten pregnant. Then she wouldn't have left work today, Matt wouldn't have become worried, and they wouldn't have reconciled.

"Em?" Matt asked softly.

"Yeah?"

"I'm glad the baby is mine," he said truthfully.

Emily pulled back to look into his eyes. "Me too."

He smiled. It was what he'd been thinking after the pregnancy sunk in. If she'd be carrying some other man's child, it would have hurt him badly, and driven a permanent wedge between them.

"You still love me?" Emily suddenly asked.

"Yes, of course," Matt answered quickly, a little taken aback.

"Then stay tonight, and hold me?" Her voice wasn't needy, but hopeful.

"Every night you want me here," he promised, brushing some of her hair back.

"Then you may never go home again," she joked, before going serious again. "I love you too."

Matt kissed her then, for the first time in seven weeks, and it was a sweet and breath-taking as he could imagine. They walked back to the bedroom, and crawled under the covers. It had been a long, emotional day, and they were tired. But tomorrow they had off to figure out the wrinkle in their relationship.

Tomorrow, make-up sex would also be on the agenda.

* * *

_Thank you everyone who has reviewed this week, and thank you for reading this story!_


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